Full name: Alex Barlow
Role: Director, Sentinel Brewing Co, Master Brewer, author, beer judge, brewing consultant
DOB: 11 August 1965
Birthplace: Chester
Twitter Handle: @sentinelbrew
Website: http://www.sentinelbrewing.co
Fun Fact: Alex has what many people would imagine to be a dream job – running his own brewery, writing (award winning) books about beer, and acting as a brewing consultant and beer judge all over the world.
So, let’s start at the beginning. You’re surely one of the world’s most knowledgable people around beer and beer making – but how did you get started? Did you always know that a career in beer was on the cards? Did you come from a foodie family?
No, I didn’t always know that a career in beer was on the cards (and could have ended up as a cardiovascular researcher). But right from my first job, working in my local pub and cleaning the beer lines, I enjoyed the taste of the fresh beer and realised that I loved a broad range of beers, from cask ales to lagers and stouts. So like many, I started in a pub job, but I perhaps enjoyed it more than many people do, and saw it as an opportunity to get involved in the industry.
Whilst I wouldn’t say I come from an especially foodie family, my grandmother was a great cook and so is my mother. She’s also a great baker my mum, making wonderful scones and parkin.
Tell us a little about the ALL BEER Guide – how did that come about, and what does it entail? What does the average casual or noncommittal drinker need to know about beer, anyway?!
The stimulus was to create the equivalent of a course about beer but for people who wouldn’t get to take a course about beer, like most bar service staff. The guide also works as a coffee table book and as a manual for consumer insights. It’s intended to provide a brewers’ perspective on beer: not on brands, because there are any number of books about different beer brands, but about the nuts & bolts of the many styles of beer, and what makes them different.
You examine beer sommeliers too, right? As far as I know that is a very rare and specialised group of people. What does it take to become a beer sommelier, and what does examining them entail?
It takes an extraordinary amount of commitment to become a beer sommelier, and plenty of stamina. You need an appetite for learning, you can take courses but you need to commit to self-directed studying too. You need to have the curiosity to want to focus and be highly aware every time you eat food and drink a beer and put the two together, really concentrating on what your senses are telling you about what is and isn’t working.
As far as the assessments are concerned I ask candidates to blind-taste a range of beers and tell me what they are experiencing; I want clear, correct and concise descriptions. It takes a lot of work and you have to be in touch with what your senses are telling you and have the knowledge to be able to think “I am experiencing these flavours, what would this beer pair well with?” Anyone who achieves the qualification really deserves it, and I encourage people I work with not to put people up for it unless they are well prepared and ready.
What is your most memorable beer drinking experience? Also, if you have a favourite beer (or style of beer?) please tell us what it is.
Can I have 2? I was working at Stones brewery when we went on a stag weekend to Edinburgh. We hired a 7 seater car; 6 of us were travelling so the 7th seat enabled us to place an 18 gallon cask of Stones Best Bitter with a handpull. Pity the poor driver: the rest of us were getting the most jealous looks from everyone around us in the Friday night traffic jams on the A1.
For quality and freshness of beer in a fantastic location, a small bar in Český Krumlov (a city in the South Bohemia region of the Czech Republic) with a balcony over the river, sitting in the sun, drinking a pint of Budvar, and looking across at the castle (which is a World Heritage Site), when I was working in Prague as brewing director for Staropramen Braník.
I don’t have a favourite style of beer: I’ve always been a portfolio drinker, and like a genuinely broad selection of beers. I drink to suit the occasion, the food I’m having, my mood or if there’s a particularly special beer available. That’s what has lead to the range at Sentinel, of the beers we brew and of the beers we stock – and I am like a kid in a sweet shop.
Could you tell us a little about the Sentinel Brewery? When were you founded, what do you make there…? All that good stuff!
Sentinel is a brewhouse, bar, eatery and events venue all in the same space, which we’ve sometimes described as a “theatre of beer.” We opened in May 2016 after transforming a former carpet showroom and warehouse in the Cultural Industries Quarter of Sheffield – convenient for the city centre, for students, and the railway station.
We’ve recruited a talented chef and kitchen team and our philosophy is to give food and drink lovers the chance to see the whole journey in the life of their beer – from sacks of grain to fermenting tanks to bar and table in just 20 metres, and to enjoy wonderful food at the same time.
You also host a course on starting your own microbrewery. Could you give us a basic outline of what that entails? I’m always curious as to where people draw the line between ‘home brew’ and ‘microbrewery’…
Yes, I present a day about starting a microbrewery on the Brew School’s courses – which often entails me trying to persuade people not to start one – I do my best to discourage any but the most capable and determined unless they really are prepared to go through all the trials and tribulations it entails!
I’m not sure some people can or do draw the line between home brew and microbrewery, it is increasingly blurred, and I have encountered some people already selling beer that they have brewed in a piece of equipment designed for home brewing. Which is possible, but don’t give up the day job.
What’s a ‘day in your life’ like? Could you give us an insight into the beer business?
There’s no typical day which is one of the things that I love about what i do: I am very easily bored and wouldn’t like to do same thing every day. So a week will involve a certain amount of mundane admin, but will involve a lot of direct customer communication: serving people over the bar, talking with people about our beers including potential wholesale customers.
And of course it will involve brewing, which varies week by week: l love brewing and when I was only concentrating on consulting and teaching I found that all I wanted to do was get back to brewing myself. I love being creative: coming up with new recipes, pairing beer with food, communicating with customers and about events – it all gives me a buzz, no two days are the same.
What’s your greatest/most memorable professional moment been, so far?
It has to be the opening of Sentinel: when I watched people drinking the first beer that I had brewed in my own brewhouse, in a project that has taken me 5 years to get off the ground and 10 years in concept – it was hugely satisfying and I couldn’t have been prouder.
Where do you get your ideas?
Anyone who says they don’t get inspired by, or evolve recipes from, other brewers is lying. I’m inspired by all sorts of other great beers and products – and am always looking at all sorts of other flavour combinations.
I once did a psychometric test which found that I’m a great synthesiser, pulling together a variety of threads to make a great whole. In brewing I try to weave shreds of concepts, ingredients and processes into something that looks and tastes fantastic. And I’m still working on it: all of my recipes are works in progress.
What’s your philosophy, summed up in a sentence?
Well, it’s what I’ve always told the kids and relates to this place as much as life in general: find something you’re good at, find a way for it to make you money, and do it to make other people happy.
And I’m pretty handy at the brewing side, at educating and talking about beer; this place is designed to bring all that together – that’s hopefully how to make people happy and provides an income for the people that work here.
What’s the biggest challenge you’ve had, how did you overcome it, and what did you learn from it?
It’s been to get the money together to get this place to happen – that’s why it took 5 years. But I am very fortunate to have found investors who love the concept and who have great respect for pairing high quality beer and good. They’ve taken a leap of faith, and getting the faith of those directors and investors enabled us to secure their involvement, without which all the other elements of our launch funding couldn’t have come into place. What did I learn? Never give up!
Who’s the person who’s most inspired you in your work – food industry or otherwise? Is there anyone that you draw inspiration or strength from? Do you have any specific culinary influences?
I couldn’t name a single person: there are many brewers that I have enormous respect for, and there are quite a lot of chefs who double up as food presenters who are superb communicators. Chefs who are good what what they do and good at communicating at the same time have an amazing skill. When I am brewing I want to concentrate and focus on what I’m doing.
What do you enjoy most and least about what you do?
What I enjoy least are all the elements of basic (and not so basic) admin that comes with running a business. What I love: brewing and presenting.
What advice would you give to aspiring food and drinks entrepreneurs who’d want the kind of results that you’ve had?
Know your audience. And you must be prepared to develop and adapt based on feedback.
If you weren’t doing what you do now, what would you be doing instead?
Probably working for GlaxoSmithKline – I was offered a cardiovascular research job by them straight out of University. But I made the right call!
If you could get anyone to try your beers (fictional or real, living or dead) who would you pick and which of the beers would you like them to try? Assume that they go on to be your brand ambassador…
I’ve been endlessly inspired by the innovation and quality of execution coming from some of the founding American craft brewers who brew big characterful, flavoursome beers. There are many whom I could name but I guess I’d choose Ken Grossman from Sierra Nevada. I love his beers, his attention to detail and quality in everything that bears the Sierra Nevada name. I really respect that and he’d make one helluva brand ambassador!
What’s your ultimate aim and goal for Sentinel Brewery. If you could achieve anything with it, what would you pick? Money and reality are no obstacle, so shoot for the moon…
I’d love to win the Best Small Brewer Award at the World Beer Cup (which would mean winning a number of medals in one particular year’s competition).
Where next for you?
Onward and upward. We are only just getting started at Sentinel and there are so many people who love beer, who we’d like to reach and attract to our unique venue. But we’re not trying to run ahead too fast: we want to walk and jog before we can run, then we’ll go for the marathon.
And we always ask three customary ridiculous questions…
If you had a time machine that could send you backward in time as far as you wanted (without any logical paradoxes, timeline contamination, etc.) – what period of time would you visit and what are the first 3 things you’d do once you got there?
I’d go back to the 1790s and get myself a job in a porter brewery in London. I’d learn about porter brewing, then sail on a ship carrying porters and IPAs over to India. Imagine it: the sights, the smells, the hustle and bustle of daily life around London, the eponymous porters. I’d get to find out how porter was brewed then, what it tasted like – we all speculate – and would find out just how good (or not) the IPAs were when they arrived in India.
If you were forced to live on one kind of alcohol for the rest of your life (assume that your metabolism becomes specifically adapted to use this as your sole source of calories, so you had to drink this to survive) – which would you pick, and why?
You don’t need to ask really! Beer. [Ed: #rekt]
If you had to employ any character from Game of Thrones to come and work with you, who would you pick, and why?
Well, that’s an easy question to answer – I’ve never watched it, not even an episode, so I’m afraid I can’t employ any of them. I’m sure none of them could match my team at Sentinel for passion, commitment and communication anyway. However, one of our trainee brewers, Lewis, looks like he could feature in Game of Thrones!